Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon

Rochelle and I watched this last night, recorded off Stars onto our TiVo. (I had seen it before, in a theater, but it was Rochelle’s first viewing.)

Even on the small screen, this is an astonishing movie. Most of the many, many Chinese historical / fantasy action movies are long on action, and short on plot — if there’s any discernible plot at all. Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon proved that adding great writing to the usual elements could produce a movie that is not only likely the best in its genre, but also a Great Film.

It blows me away that this movie was beaten by Gladiator in the Best Picture category of the Academy Awards. While Gladiator is a decent, enjoyable movie, in anything but the short run it’s completely forgettable. (It would have been forgivable to have given the honor to Traffic, itself a great movie.)

Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon is anything but forgettable. Make sure you see this movie.